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What it means to sell your expertise

You can execute, mark up a team, sell your thinking, or teach. Each is a valid way to package expertise; the point is knowing which one you're in.

Kevin C. Whelan

As an independent marketing professional, there are a few ways you can operate:

  1. You can personally execute the work
  2. You can hire a team to execute the work and mark up their time
  3. You can sell strategy, planning, and oversight
  4. You can teach others how the work gets done

There are no right or wrong ways to operate.

If you are doing #1, you package your expertise into your execution work.

If you are doing #2, you infuse your expertise into your team’s execution work.

If you are doing #3, you refer the execution work and clients pay you for your thinking.

If you’re doing #4, you package your expertise into scalable education products and subscriptions.

There’s no right or wrong way to do things. It’s a sliding scale.

I prefer to live in #3 and #4 and stay small. But that’s just me.

What does selling your expertise mean to you?